Hungary Agrees to Pay Pensions to Widows of Jewish Conscripts Killed in Russia

September 12, 1943

Zurich (Sep. 10)

The Hungarian Government has agreed to pay pensions to the widows of Jewish slave laborers who perished on the Russian front, according to Budapest newspapers reaching here today. The pensions will be equal to those paid the widows of Hungarian soldiers.

If this new regulation is observed, it will mark a sharp reversal of policy on the part of the Hungarian authorities. Although there has been a statute on the books providing for the payment of allowances to families of Jews sent to forced labor battalions, the regulation has not been enforced in practice. Various devices were used to prevent Jewish women from obtaining the grants. The question was debated in parliament several months age when liberal deputies protested the treatment of the Jews and their families. It has been estimated by Soviet quarters that about 250,000 Hungarian Jews were sent to the Russian front. A large proportion of them died either from mistreatment, starvation or wounds.